Belhar Confession: Disappointed with Debate

For the past few years, the Christian Reformed Church has been discussing whether or not to adopt another confession.  The Belhar Confession comes from the Reformed Churches of South Africa, and was written as a response to the racist policies of Apartheid.

When I first read the Belhar Confession, I was immediately impressed with the kind of challenge it offered Christians to strive for Unity, Justice, and Reconciliation.  I also appreciated the strong stance it took against racism.

The Christian Reformed Church of North America has not always taken a strong stance against racism, and there are many who have misused Calvinist teachings to support racism and slavery.  As a pastor in the Christian Reformed Church, I was pleased to see the opportunity for our denomination to make this kind of strong stance against the misuse of the Bible to support racist and discriminatory practices and attitudes.

In the past year, there was a lot of discussion about whether or not the Belhar Confession should be approved as a standard for our denomination.  If it were declared a confession, pastors, ministry associates, elders, and deacons would be required to sign a form voicing their agreement with the doctrines of the document.

In June, 2012, the Synod of the Christian Reformed Church decided to voice their approval of the Belhar Confession but did not add it as a binding confession for our denomination.  This means that we have affirmed that the Belhar is worth studying, but we will not make members, pastor, or church leaders sign a statement to signify their agreement.

The discussion surrounding the Belhar Confession seemed to revolve around whether the statement was worthy of being approved as a full confession.  While many liked the document, there were concerns that it remained vague about doctrinal issues that our other confessions addressed more thoroughly. 

Because of the debate and concerns surrounding the Belhar, I think our Synod made a good decision in how to receive this document.  However, the discussions of the past year leave a bad taste in my mouth.

When I first started studying the Belhar, I thought this discussion would offer a great opportunity for our denomination to address some of our struggles to become a multi-ethnic body of believers.  Because our church can trace its historical roots to the Netherlands, we have often struggled with the characterization of being a “Dutch church.” 

I had hoped the discussion of the Belhar would prompt our church to some reflective self analysis, so that we could consider whether we harbor unfair characterizations of people from different races, or so that we could evaluate whether some of our traditional practices have deeper roots in our cultural heritage than in Biblical instruction.

I had also hoped that the discussion of the Belhar would help many white Christians realize the damage that the history of racism has created in our world.  It is very easy for those of us who are Caucasian to downplay the damage of racism as a problem of the past.  We can point to the changes in legal and corporate policies in the past fifty years, and believe that the problem of racism has been completely eradicated.  When we do this, we fail to realize that there are still some who harbor discriminatory, prejudiced, and even hateful attitudes towards others simply on the basis of skin color.

Furthermore, even if we could magically eliminate all racial prejudices in people’s hearts today, we would still have many people who feel bitterness and resentment because of the way they have been treated in the past.  The problem is racism is bigger than we might be willing to acknowledge.  I had hoped that the introduction of the Belhar would prompt more discussion about our efforts to pursue unity, in spite of the damage of racism.  Instead, we talked about the definitions and expectations of a confession.

Although the discussion about the Belhar had value – because it is worthwhile for us to consider the meaning and value of our confessional standards – I was disappointed because I had hoped for a different tone to our conversation.  I still hope the use of the Belhar will stir members of our churches to pursue Unity, Justice, and Reconciliation; but the direction of the conversation regarding the Belhar Confession did not move us into that discussion.